Cnidaria are aquatic (mostly marine) animals. Their primary identifying feature is cnidocytes, specialized cells that are used to capture prey. Cnidaria include jellyfish, sea anemones, corals, and jellyfish among other creatures. Luckily I did not come across these in their natural habitat. Despite my love of marine life, I have no desire to actually be touching it or having it touch me… I took these photos at the New England Aquarium in Boston using my almost indestructible little Canon Powershot G9. It’s well used but still works great. I used the macro mode with the camera lens placed right up against the glass. The jellyfish was captured at ISO 800, f/2.8, 1/10 sec; no flash and processed in Adobe’s Lightroom 3 using the Creative split tone preset. The anemone was captured at ISO 800, f/2.8, 1/80 sec; no flash and processed in Lightroom 3 using the Edge Effects PC Vignette preset.
These are great shots! And those jellyfish were tricky to capture!